Table Numbers!

I was first inspired by this image for the table numbers.  I always knew that I wanted lots of romantic candlelight as part of the tables so I just immediately thought how lovely it would be to have glittery numbers reflecting softly.  At first, I imagined them being hung from the rafters over the table but, logistically, it would have been a number.  Being practical meant having to find another way to achieve the same look (preferably without potentially breaking my neck).

While at The Paper Source, I found cute 3D kraft numbers.  However, they only had some of the numbers in the store and they were also missing the whole set online.  I spent a week searching for substitutes online before I came upon The Craft Pedlars.  I ordered the 8" Contempo set of numbers and loved how they looked.   (P.S. I know the website looks a little sketch but I received my order without a problem).

Step 1: Spray paint the numbers gold (or whatever you want the glitter to be).  You definitely need to spray paint a base on the numbers because glitter will fall off every single minute and you don't want people to see a brown number.  If you are putting the numbers on the bases, you might want to spray paint the bases gold also.

Side note: Doing this in the city while renting an apartment is a lot harder than you would think.  I thought about spray painting on the roof of our building but security does a pass through every 30 minutes and I doubt building management would approve of me up there with spray paint.  Then Brian said I couldn't do it on the sidewalk or the park (probably a good idea) so we ended up doing it in the alley behind his sister's apartment.  We thought it would be a nice private area but it's actually on the route of the Duck Tours and Trolley tours on their way to the Bunker Hill monument.  It also was a crazy windy day so we were running around trying to find anything that would hold down the plastic dropcloth.

Step 2: Once the spray paint has dried, use spray adhesive glue to spray all over your numbers.  Then quickly sprinkle your glitter over the the numbers.  We did this over a box so that we could reuse any glitter that fell off.  I used Martha Stewart's Glitter and used just over 1 bottle for 9 numbers.  

Step 3: Once everything has dried, glue the numbers to the bases.  I wish I had a better way of telling you to do this.  Ideally, I would have found a way to somehow stabilize my numbers by using a stake or something.  But I didn't have time to rig anything so I used small wood bases from Michael's and just superglued it.  However, I did this at 3 am the morning of the wedding in the hotel bathroom.  Glitter was everywhere and the superglue was really not that effective.  Somehow, number 7 worked perfectly and dried right away with only 1/4 of space to glue.  However, number 2 which should have been SO easy to glue and stand just would not glue correctly or stick.  So brides, sorry I can't tell you a better way of displaying your numbers easily.  I can just tell you NOT to do what I did if you want to keep your sanity.  However, the ending result was very pretty (if I do say so myself).  :)

*grrr, you number 2.  you had such a big base, why would't you stick?!